Hunger
by Just Jill
Summary: What's the best way to anger a Vampire?


Writers Note: For a while in college I played roll playing games, and one of my favorites is _Vampire: the Masquarade_. I haven't had a chance to play in far too long (all of my friends will tell me it's because I live in the wrong place... picky picky... they all live about 1000 miles. Long drive once a week), but I was looking through some stuff and unearthed this one. It's actually not fanfic other than it's set in a world not of my own making. And he really shouldn't look too familiar... I don't think.

Writer's Note Two: This is just something that completely possessed me, and I really enjoyed writing it. Hope you like it as much as I do!

# Hunger

The sun hovered over the horizon, a large, red-orange ball of flame. Shadows stretched like burnt fingers across the city, waiting to squeeze out the life left in it. Slowly, ponderously, the orb lowered into the desert just beyond the city limits. 

One room inside that city had been reinforced in stone, with no windows. A heavy wooden door with a small window looked out on a narrow, well lit corridor. A heavy padlock hung outside the door. Inside, the light illuminated a figure. He lay shirtless on his stomach, manacles binding his wrist, elbows, and ankles together. 

The second the upper edge of the sun vanished below the horizon, his brown eyes snapped open. He lifted his head, the shoulder-length brown hair falling across his face. His eyes, touched with madness, fixed on the window. He had no thoughts in his head, only a raging hunger, a desperate need to feed. He pulled futilely at the manacles around his arms, just above his elbows, then relented. Before long, he rested his head on the floor, burning eyes fixed on the door. 

The padlock rattled about an hour later; his head came up like a dog's. Framed in the window, he could see a stranger; an older man, perhaps sixty, with graying black hair. The door opened then, and the prisoner had two men to focus on. The second was younger than the man framed in the window, with brown hair and a trimmed mustache. The two walked in, silent, and stopped. 

"What's his name?" the older man asked. The younger stepped forward, and hauled his prisoner to his knees. 

Karl, his name is Karl, the bound man thought in a haze of rage and hunger. I thought he was my friend. 

"Did you hear?" Karl demanded. "What's your name?" 

The pain from tortured muscles burned into his mind, and between that and the Beast raging inside him, it took him a minute to focus on the question. "Dorian," he said through gritted teeth. He waited, the pulsing steam of life beckoning to him, just out of reach. 

"Dorian? Not Dracula?" the stranger asked, a hint of laughter in his voice. Dorian shifted his glance between them, edging slowly towards Karl. Just one little inch. "Just a name isn't enough, Karl." 

"Yes, Earl, I know." 

There, no, just a little... Now! His retractable fangs snapped down as he bit into the bare arm next to him. 

The warm, red liquid filled his mouth, the Beast chortling as it drank. As the life flowed into him, he felt the control return, and his strength. He needed his strength to get out. 

A sudden blow to the back, combined with a yank backwards on his hair, dislodged him, and he fell onto his back, onto the tortured muscles of his arms twisted behind him. He snarled and with a convulsive movement flipped over on his stomach. After a short consideration, totally ignoring the other two, he decided that breaking free was his first priority, even though it put him dangerously close to frenzy, draining the little blood he had. Another short moment of concentration, and the manacles on his arms parted. 

With a quick movement, he stood, judging he could deal with the leg chains later. The older man was halfway to the door, dragging Karl with him, when Dorian reached him. "Be careful how you treat a vampire," he growled. "He'll come back to haunt you." Then, unable to control the Beast any longer, he bit into the man's shoulder and drank. 

When he was full, he let the man slump to the floor. "You guys are really dumb," he said to the two unconscious and dying men on the floor. "Never mess with a vampire. We are not very forgiving." He turned, pausing only long enough to break the leg chain, and left the room, closing and padlocking the door behind him.

  



End file.
